OBSERVATION Bilateral Sudden Deafness as a Prodrome of Anterior Inferior Cerebellar Artery Infarction Hyung Lee, MD; Gregory T. Whitman, MD; Jung Geung Lim, MD; Sang Doe Lee, MD; Young Chun Park, MD Background: Acute ischemic stroke in the distribu- ness, and ataxia. T2-weighted magnetic resonance im- tion of the anterior inferior cerebellar artery is known to aging scans showed hyperintensities in the right lateral be associated with hearing loss, facial weakness, ataxia, pons and right middle cerebral peduncle and a possible nystagmus, and hypalgesia. There have been few re- abnormality of the left middle cerebellar peduncle. A mag- ports on bilateral deafness and vertebrobasilar occlusive netic resonance angiogram showed moderately severe ste- disease. Furthermore, previous reports have not empha- nosis of the distal vertebral artery and middle third of the sized the inner ear as a localization of bilateral deafness. basilar artery. The patient’s right limb coordination and gait improved steadily over several weeks, but there was Objective: To describe the presentation of acute ische- no improvement in hearing in his right ear. mic stroke in the distribution of the anterior inferior cerebellar artery as sudden bilateral hearing loss with Conclusions: The relatively isolated onset of deafness as minimal associated signs. well as the severity and persistence of the hearing loss led us to conclude that the hearing loss in this case was likely Design and Setting: Case report and tertiary care due to prominent hypoperfusion of the internal auditory hospital. artery, with labyrinthine infarction as the earliest event. Vertebrobasilar occlusive disease should be considered in Patient: A 66-year-old man with diabetes mellitus de- the differential diagnosis of sudden bilateral deafness. veloped sudden bilateral deafness, unilateral tinnitus, and vertigo 7 days before the onset of dysarthria, facial weak- Arch Neurol. 2001;58:1287-1289 UDDEN DEAFNESS may be de- bilateral deafness.11,12,15,16 We describe a pa- fined as more than 20 dB of tient with AICA infarction who presented sensorineural hearing loss with isolated sudden bilateral deafness as occurring over minutes to the initial symptom. hours.1 Sudden deafness oc- Scurs unilaterally in most cases, and bilat- REPORT OF A CASE eral, simultaneous, sudden deafness is a rare condition, accounting for 0.44% to 3.4%2,3 A 66-year-old man with type 2 diabetes of cases of sudden deafness. Unilateral, sud- mellitus suddenly developed bilateral hear- den deafness in a young patient is usually ing loss, tinnitus in his right ear, and vertigo, idiopathic and is often thought to be all of which he noticed when he got up in viral4,5or autoimmune6 in origin. On the the morning. He did not have dysarthria, other hand, sudden deafness in an older pa- weakness, ataxia, diplopia, dysphagia, Hor- tient with known cerebrovascular occlu- ner syndrome, or sensory loss. The hearing sive disease suggests the likelihood of is- losspersisted,butthevertigosubsidedwithin chemia in the distribution of the internal 1 day, and subsequent examination showed auditory artery, ordinarily a branch of the only mild unsteadiness of gait. Seven days anterior inferior cerebellar artery (AICA).7-10 after the initial onset of the bilateral hear- Characteristically, sudden bilateral deaf- ing loss and vertigo, the patient presented ness due to AICA ischemia is associated with with exacerbation of the hearing loss in multiple brainstem signs.11,12 The AICA sup- his right ear, combined with right-sided tin- plies the dorsolateral pons, middle cerebel- nitus, vertigo, nausea, and incoordination. lar peduncle, inner ear, and anterior infe- On examination, he had a spontaneous rior cerebellum, including the flocculus.13,14 left-beating nystagmus with a horizontal- From the Departments of Infrequently, infarction of the AICA terri- torsional component in primary position Neurology, School of Medicine, tory is preceded by isolated episodes of ver- and with gaze to the right or left. There was Keimyung University, Taegu, 7-10 Korea (Drs H. Lee, Lim, tigo or unilateral hearing loss. There have diminished right-sided facial sensation, a S. D. Lee, and Park), and been few reports on bilateral deafness and right-sided facial palsy with peripheral fea- 11,12,15,16 University of California, Irvine, vertebrobasilar occlusive disease. tures, and dysmetria of the right limbs. Au- College of Medicine Furthermore, previous reports have not em- diometry showed moderate sensorineural (Dr Whitman). phasized the inner ear as a localization of hearing loss of 55 dB with 100% speech dis- (REPRINTED) ARCH NEUROL / VOL 58, AUG 2001 WWW.ARCHNEUROL.COM 1287 ©2001 American Medical Association. All rights reserved. Downloaded From: https://jamanetwork.com/ on 09/24/2021 Figure 1. Axial T2-weighted magnetic resonance image shows Figure 2. Magnetic resonance angiogram shows moderately severe stenosis of hyperintensities involving the right middle cerebellar peduncle, right lateral the distal right vertebral artery (long arrow) and middle third of the basilar artery pons, and possibly the left middle cerebellar peducle. (short arrow). The left distal vertebral artery is also visualized (arrowhead). crimination on the right and 45 dB with 100% speech 5 of the 20 patients had hearing loss as part of the stroke discrimination on the left. Electronystagmography showed syndrome. However, none had hearing loss at stroke on- no response to caloric stimulation of the right ear; and set, although 2 had tinnitus at onset. All patients with hear- oculomotor testing showed asymmetrical abnormalities ing loss had vertigo or unsteadiness at stroke onset. In 1998, of both smooth pursuit and optokinetic nystagmus. Roquer et al18 described 15 patients with AICA strokes. All T2-weighted magnetic resonance imaging scans re- 15 patients had vertigo or ataxia, and 6 of the 15 had hear- vealed hyperintense foci involving the right dorsolat- ing loss. However, the timing of hearing loss in relation to eral pons, right middle cerebellar peduncle, and possi- vertigo and ataxia was not reported. Stephan et al11 de- bly the left middle cerebellar peduncle (Figure 1). A scribed a patient with sudden, bilateral deafness caused by magnetic resonance angiogram showed moderately se- basilar artery occlusion who later developed progressive vere stenosis of the distal right vertebral artery and the quadriplegia with mental status abnormalities. Huang et middle third of the basilar artery (Figure 2). A trans- al12 described 7 patients with bilateral, sudden deafness in thoracic echocardiogram and an electrocardiogram vertebrobasilar occlusive disease. All but 1 of the 7 pa- revealed no abnormalities. tients had bilateral hearing impairment as the initial symp- During several days of anticoagulation in the hos- tom. However, 3 of the 7 patients also had quadriparesis pital, the patient’s vertigo and nausea improved. A fol- (n=1), hemianesthesia (n=1), or dysarthria (n=1) at on- low-up audiogram showed a profound hearing loss in the set, and 4 had vertigo at onset. The report did not include right ear, and the hearing loss in the left ear had im- audiometric data, limiting localization. Five of the pa- proved to 30 dB (Figure 3). His right limb coordina- tients in this series had poor outcomes, including the tion and gait improved steadily over several weeks, but locked-in syndrome and severe ataxia with abasia. One pa- there was no improvement in hearing in his right ear. At tient had permanent bilateral deafness and diplopia, and last follow-up, he remained on a daily regimen of war- only 1 patient made a good recovery. Presumably, these 2 farin and has had no further neurological symptoms. previous reports reflect severe ischemic damage to mul- tiple structures in the posterior fossa. Therefore, the clini- COMMENT cal course in our patient may have been remarkable in that there were few residual deficits. Sudden deafness with vertigo usually suggests the diagno- In our patient, bilateral deafness and tinnitus oc- sis of an inner ear disorder, eg, Meniere disease, acute laby- curred several days before the sudden onset of AICA stroke rinthitis, autoimmune inner ear disease, or perilymphatic with typical brainstem signs. The analogous presentation fistula. Previous reports of sudden, bilateral deafness caused of isolated vertigo has become well recognized, following by vertebrobasilar occlusive disease have been rare. In 1943, its description by Grad and Baloh.7 These authors re- Adams15 was the first to completely describe the syn- ported that of 84 patients with vertigo of presumed vas- drome associated with AICA occlusion. In his patient, tin- cular origin, 36 had episodic, isolated vertigo and 35 had nitus was an early symptom, appearing soon after vertigo, definite caloric paresis or weakness. It was suggested that and the patient had acute bilateral, asymmetrical hearing vertebrobasilar ischemia may selectively damage the in- loss, suggesting bilateral ischemia. Adams alluded to the ner ear because of this structure’s high energy require- difficulty of assigning a time of onset to the symptom of ments and the lack of adequate collateral blood supply.7,8 hearing loss, noting that “deafness . may not at all at- With few exceptions, the internal auditory artery receives tract the attention of an unobservant patient.” Details of its blood supply from the AICA, and the inner ear receives the timing of hearing loss in patients with stroke have sel- its sole blood supply from the internal auditory artery. Pre- dom been reported, suggesting that the issue of transient vious reports have suggested that the inner ear is one of ischemic attacks consisting of hearing loss could have been the most commonly affected areas in AICA strokes.7-10 Hear- frequently overlooked. In 1990, Amarenco et al17 de- ing loss for pure tones is unusual with central lesions, even scribed a series of 20 patients with AICA distribution strokes: in the late stages.19 Our patient had persistent, unilateral, (REPRINTED) ARCH NEUROL / VOL 58, AUG 2001 WWW.ARCHNEUROL.COM 1288 ©2001 American Medical Association.